Lucius Verginius Rufus

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Lucius Verginius Rufus (* around 14 at Comum ; † 97 ) was a politician and general of the Roman Empire of Italian origin. He held the consulate three times .

Verginius Rufus, the son of a Roman knight , was inducted into the Senate as the first member of his family . He went through the senatorial office career and reached the consulate under Emperor Nero 63. In 67 Nero appointed him legate of the province of Upper Germany , in which three legions were stationed. In this capacity, Verginius Rufus put down the rebellion of Gaius Iulius Vindex in the battle of Vesontio in 68 . He rejected the imperial crown, which his soldiers had offered him several times, on the grounds that he would only recognize an emperor elected by the Senate. Perhaps he was concerned about his low parentage.

In 69, Verginius Rufus was replaced as governor by Marcus Hordeonius Flaccus and returned to Rome , where he first became a suffect consul and a little later took over the consulate for the second time. After Nero killed himself and his successor Galba was murdered, Otho now officiated as emperor. When he suffered a devastating defeat against Vitellius after only three months in office , Verginius Rufus recommended the Senate to recognize the victor as emperor. Once again pushed to the imperial throne, he refused again and retired to Alsium for almost three decades , where he wrote poetry and ran a literary salon. The rhetorician Quintilian and the younger Pliny , whose guardian Verginius Rufus had become after the early death of his father, were probably among his guests.

In 97 Emperor Nerva succeeded in persuading him to return to politics by offering a joint consulate. However, when Verginius Rufus was supposed to deliver his inaugural address as consul, he slipped and broke his hip. He died a few months later as a result of this fall and was given a state funeral; the tomb was given by the historian Tacitus . The house in Alsium where Verginius Rufus had spent so many years went to Pliny the Younger.

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Remarks

  1. ↑ CIL 6,397 ; Tacitus , Annals 15,23,1.
  2. ↑ Cassius Dio 63.23.1-63.24.4.
  3. ↑ Plutarch , Galba 10; Concerns about ancestry: Tacitus, Historien 1,52,4.
  4. ↑ Extensive obituary with description of the life and death of Verginius Rufus with Pliny the Younger, Letters 2,1.
personal data
SURNAME Verginius Rufus, Lucius
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Rufus, Lucius Verginius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman politician and general
DATE OF BIRTH at 14
PLACE OF BIRTH at Como
DATE OF DEATH 97